10 Apple Macintosh Software Essentials for Small Business

Posted on April 20, 2011

So you’ve heard that you must be on a pc to do business right? Wrong… don’t let them fool you. I work every day on a Mac and I wouldn’t give it up for anything.

Apple equipment not only has a better design, but the quality of the hardware is amazing, the operating system is simple and effortless.

There is a renewed interest in Macs now with the amazing success of the iPad, iPod and iPhone markets. These devices have helped people realize that yes, life can be easy.

For the PC users who say… I just don’t get it? It’s because you’ve been conditioned to try to make things difficult. I’ve worked with PC and MAC for the last 20 years, and I can tell you that if you can learn windows, you can fly through mac os in no time.

So how do you use a Mac for business applications? Well as a full-time Internet Marketer, I am happy to show you what I use. Most of it is free, or a fraction of the price of PC software.

2: Evernote
– (FREE) I hear this is the ultimate note organization software, though I haven’t used it yet. I still have text files and stickies all over my desktop.
3: Pages
– ($20) Writing software that gives you a ton of great templates to go into for drag and drop design of newsletter, brochures, etc. Also publishes ebooks to epub format for ipad/iphones etc.

4: Pixelmator
– ($60) This is the best photoshop alternative ever. No more dealing with friends who want to “borrow” photoshop or being frustrated with GIMP for me. Pixelmator can open and edit PSD’s too. The only drawback that I have found is that when someone tries to open my exported PSD’s, the text is rendered. Other than that, it’s pretty much perfect, especially since it’s 90%+ cheaper than photoshop.
5: Keynote
– ($20) – 100x Better than Powerpoint. Amazing templates, exports to video, and more. I run these back through iMovie for more effects. Intro/exits, etc. Also integrates with the Keynote iPhone app.

6: Screenium
– ($20) – Screen Capture Software that rivals the $300 Camtasia on PC. Also works well importing into iMovie.

7. TextWrangler
– (Free) A Simple HTML editor. I actually use this as a text editor too since the default mac text editor captures more than raw text in cut/paste.

Tell the world!:

July 4, 2011 (12:48 pm)

You missed the most important of them all: Parallels. For anyone converting from PC to Windows, you will always have a program or two you will need to continue running or files that you still need to open. Parallels helps overcome that “what if” anxiety and leave the PC completely behind. Of course, you will still need a copy of Windows (I recommend XP) to install in Parallels. And that old OEM Windows XP CD you have laying around won’t work, unfortunately.

July 5, 2011 (12:08 am)

I have intentionally avoided Parallels. Living in this space and time is enough for me! Ha, actually I do have a Windows Vista powered HP laptop that I occasionally refer to for small tasks and just to make sure things don’t look goofy to pc users.

July 4, 2011 (1:53 pm)

Thanks, Tony! I am also a long time PC/ MAC user and absolutely agree with your premise. MAC has state of the art UX, PC (Windows) is a distant second. I don’t think any of us could predict that Apple would one day be worth more than Microsoft. Today the PC is the dominant business platform and many of us work directly on a PC or exchange files with clients using the same software.

July 5, 2011 (12:21 am)

Mac has always been a strong player in the music industry. Yes, I attempted to master the PC universe for a few years for business, but after many disappointments, I returned to Mac as my full-time tool of choice.

I attend a great number of webinars and watch a variety of online videos by Internet Marketers, and it’s clear to see that Mac is now quickly becoming the Industry standard for the Internet Marketing genre.